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The Socialist Market
Economy in Asia
Development in China,
Vietnam and Laos
Edited by
a rv e h a nse n
jo i nge be k k e vol d
k r i s t e n nor dh aug
The Socialist Market Economy in Asia
Arve Hansen · Jo Inge Bekkevold ·
Kristen Nordhaug
Editors
The Socialist Market

Economy in Asia
Development in China, Vietnam and Laos
Editors
Arve Hansen Jo Inge Bekkevold
Centre for Development and the Norwegian Institute for Defence
Environment Studies
University of Oslo Oslo, Norway
Oslo, Norway
Kristen Nordhaug
Oslo Metropolitan University
Oslo, Norway
ISBN 978-981-15-6247-1 ISBN 978-981-15-6248-8 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-6248-8
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2020

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Acknowledgments
The idea of this book took shape through the panel “Understanding the
Socialist Market Economy: Development, Transformations and Contra-
dictions in China, Vietnam and Laos” at the NORASIA VII conference
organized by the Norwegian Network for Asian Studies at the University
of Oslo in 2017. We would like to thank Kenneth Bo Nielsen for inviting
us to set up a panel at the conference, as well as all the panel presenters
and audience for stimulating discussions.
The editors would like to thank all the contributors for excellent
work and great cooperation. We would also like to thank the anonymous
referees for supporting the project and for providing useful and construc-
tive feedback. And last, a big thank you to Sara Crowley-Vigneau and
the excellent staff at Palgrave Macmillan for their support throughout the
publishing process.
Oslo Arve Hansen

April 2020 Jo Inge Bekkevold
Kristen Nordhaug
v
Contents
Part I The Socialist Market Economy: Ideology and

Development
1 Introducing the Socialist Market Economy 3

Jo Inge Bekkevold, Arve Hansen, and Kristen Nordhaug
2 The International Politics of Economic Reforms

in China, Vietnam, and Laos 27
Jo Inge Bekkevold
3 China and Vietnam as Instances of Consolidated

Market-Leninism 69
Jonathan D. London
Part II State, Market and the Environment
4 Governance, the Socialist Market Economy,

and the Party-State in Vietnam and China 117
Thiem Hai Bui
vii
viii CONTENTS
5 Reforming State-Owned Enterprises in a Global

Economy: The Case of Vietnam 141
Hege Merete Knutsen and Do Ta Khanh
6 Rural Revolutions: Socialist, Market and Sustainable

Development of the Countryside in Vietnam and Laos 167
Robert Cole and Micah L. Ingalls
7 Evolving Environmental Governance Structures

in a Market Socialist State: The Case of Vietnam 195
Stephan Ortmann
Part III State and Society: Inequality, Class and Conflict
8 Consumer Socialism: Consumption, Development

and the New Middle Classes in China and Vietnam 221
Arve Hansen
9 Labour Conflicts in the Socialist Market Economy:

China and Vietnam 245
Kristen Nordhaug
10 Welfare and Social Policy in China: Building a New

Welfare State 267
Kristin Dalen
11 Capitalist Transformation and Habitus in Laos 291

Boike Rehbein
Part IV Concluding Observations
12 Making Sense of the Socialist Market Economy 315

Index 339
Notes on Contributors
Jo Inge Bekkevold is Senior Adviser at the Norwegian Institute for

Defence Studies. Bekkevold is a former diplomat, serving in Beijing and
Hanoi, and has worked as a trade analyst in China. He has published
widely on Chinese politics and foreign policy as well as Asian security
issues.
Robert Cole is a Doctoral candidate with the Department of Geography,
National University of Singapore, and Research Associate with the Centre
for Social Development Studies, Chulalongkorn University. His doctoral
research explores interconnections between global agri-food production
and agrarian change in Laos’ northeast borderlands with Vietnam.
Kristin Dalen is a Researcher at the Fafo Institute for Labour and Social
Research in Oslo, Norway. She is also a Ph.D. candidate at the Depart-
ment for Comparative Politics at the University of Bergen. Her current
research focuses on public perceptions of distribution, welfare schemes,
and governance in contemporary China.
Thiem Hai Bui is the Director of Research Project Management of the
Research Management Board at the Institute for Legislative Studies,
National Assembly Standing Committee of Vietnam. His research focuses
on civil society, constitutional politics, human rights, and electoral gover-
nance in Vietnam.
ix
x NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS
Arve Hansen is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Centre for Development and

the Environment at the University of Oslo and coordinator of the Norwe-
gian Network for Asian Studies. He has a decade of experience working in
and on Vietnam and has published widely on development in the country.
Micah L. Ingalls, Ph.D. is a Senior Scientist at the Centre for Devel-
opment and Environment of the University of Bern, Switzerland. Over
the past two decades, he has worked at the interface of research and
policy across Asia, focusing on natural resource governance, traditional
and non-traditional security, and rural development.
Do Ta Khanh is the Director of the Centre for EU Studies at the Insti-
tute for European Studies (under Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences).
With background in political economy, his research focuses on industrial
policy in Europe and Vietnam, particularly the interaction between policy
and the working class.
Hege Merete Knutsen is a Professor in Human Geography, Department
of Sociology and Human Geography, University of Oslo. She works in
the fields of Economic Geography (political economy), labour and devel-
opment and has research and fieldwork experiences from a number of
countries in the Global South and Global North.
Jonathan D. London is an Associate Professor of Political Economy at
Leiden University’s Institute for Area Studies. His recent publications
include Welfare and Inequality in Marketizing East Asia (Palgrave, 2018),
as well as numerous book chapters, and journal articles.
Kristen Nordhaug is a Professor of Development Studies at Oslo
Metropolitan University. Nordhaug’s research has focused on political and
economic development in East and Southeast Asia, currently in China and
Vietnam. He has previously worked on inter alia Taiwan’s development
model, the Asian financial crisis, and China’s development model.
Stephan Ortmann is an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Centre for
China Studies of Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is the author of
Politics and Change in Singapore and Hong Kong: Containing Contention
(2010) and Environmental Governance in Vietnam: Institutional Reforms
and Failures (2017).
Boike Rehbein is a full Professor of society and transformation in Asia
and Africa at Humboldt University Berlin since 2009. His areas of special-
ization are social inequality, globalization, and Southeast Asia. He has
published 24 books and around 100 articles.
List of Figures
Fig. 1.1 Annual GDP per capita growth: China 1978–2017,

Laos/Vietnam: 1985–2017 (Source data.worldbank.org) 7
Fig. 2.1 FDI net inflows as percentage of GDP, 1982–2017
(Source World Bank [2019b]) 43
Fig. 10.1 Chinese reforms of education, health and pensions
since 2003 276
xi
List of Tables
Table 1.1 Measuring development in the socialist market economy 8

Table 2.1 Membership in the World Trade Organization 32
Table 2.2 Foreign trade as percent of GDP, comparative
figures 1970–2015 38
Table 2.3 Foreign trade as percent of GDP, 2018 figures 39
Table 2.4 Trade in services as percent of GDP, 2017 figures 40
Table 2.5 Foreign direct investment inward stock, 2017 (USD
millions) 41
Table 2.6 Composition of exports, in percent (2018 figures) 45
Table 2.7 Economic Freedom Index, selected economies 46
Table 2.8 Top trading partners of Vietnam and Laos, in percent
of total trade, 2017 51
Table 8.1 The socialist consumer revolution: Number of goods
per 100 urban households 230
Table 9.1 Strikes with more than 1000 participants in China
and Guangdong Province reported by China Labour
Bulletin: Manufacturing, mining and construction 250
Table 9.2 Number of strikes in all of Vietnam, and in provinces
Ho Chi Minh City, Binh Duong and Dong Nai,
1995–2015 252
Table 11.1 Sociocultures and strata in Laos 300
Table 11.2 Habitus types in Laos 302
xiii
PART I
The Socialist Market Economy: Ideology

and Development
CHAPTER 1
Introducing the Socialist Market Economy
China, Vietnam and Laos are three of the few remaining communist
regimes in the world. They are also among the fastest growing economies
in the world, and indeed have been for some time (IMF 2019a). The
fact that three of the best growth performers in global capitalism are
authoritarian states led by communist parties with socialism as official
development goal is certainly worthy of further study. The three countries
indeed claim to have found their own model of development combining
a market economy with socialism, what we based on communist party
rhetoric summarize here as ‘the socialist market economy’. According
to official definitions, this is not capitalism, but a more sustainable
J. I. Bekkevold
Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies, Oslo, Norway
e-mail: jib@ifs.mil.no
A. Hansen (B)
Centre for Development and the Environment, University of Oslo, Oslo,
Norway
e-mail: arve.hansen@sum.uio.no
K. Nordhaug
Oslo Metropolitan University, Oslo, Norway
e-mail: Kristen.Nordhaug@oslomet.no
© The Author(s) 2020 3

A. Hansen et al. (eds.), The Socialist Market Economy in Asia,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-6248-8_1
4 J. I. BEKKEVOLD ET AL.
and socially just way of making a market economy work for national
development and the improvement of living standards.
China and Vietnam are by now considered major development success
stories. China needs little further introduction in this regard, as few coun-
tries have received more attention in the development literature over the
past decades (Lardy 2014, 2019; Naughton and Tsai 2015; Lin 2011;
Steinfeld 2000; Huang 2008; Pei 2006; Yang 2004). Extreme levels of
growth over four decades have seen China emerge as a global economic
superpower. Vietnam’s rapid development has also received significant
attention (Earl 2018; Hansen 2015; Hiep 2012; Gainsborough 2010;
London 2009; Ohno 2009; Beresford 2008; Masina 2006; Van Arkadie
and Mallon 2003; Fforde and de Vylder 1996). Some observers even
expect that it will develop into a leading Southeast Asian economic power
(World Bank 2020; Beeson and Hung Hung Pham 2012). Laos is in
many ways a different story from its communist neighbours. It remains
one of the least studied and least understood countries in Asia (Rigg
2012), despite a growing Laos development literature (e.g. Kenney-
Lazar 2019; Cole and Rigg 2019; Baird 2018; Friis and Nielsen 2016;
Dwyer et al. 2015). Furthermore, few would consider Laos a develop-
ment success story and its decades of very high levels of economic growth
has largely gone under the radar of outside observers.
High GDP growth is just one side of the story, however. Even more
impressively, growth in the socialist market economies, particularly China
and Vietnam, has been converted into poverty eradication at a speed
possibly unprecedented anywhere in the world (Malesky and London
2014). While the rapid development certainly has led to increasingly
unequal societies also in the socialist market economies, they do perform
better than countries at a similar level of income per capita on a wide
range of social and material development indicators. In fact, China,
Vietnam and Laos are all among the top ten fastest climbers upwards
the UN Human Development Index over the 1990–2015 period (UNDP
2016).
Given these development patterns, it is somewhat puzzling that the
three countries have never been subject to thorough comparative anal-
ysis. Even China and Vietnam are rarely subject to such comparison
(Malesky and London 2014; Womack 2006), although their development
models and trajectories obviously share important traits. Laos is usually
ignored altogether, and certainly not included in discussions of develop-
ment in the two other socialist market economies. And, importantly, while
1 INTRODUCING THE SOCIALIST MARKET ECONOMY 5
many scholars have pointed out the discrepancy between official socialist
ideology and developments on the ground (see London, this volume), no
study has tried systematically to make sense of the model of the ‘socialist
market economy’ that the three development success stories claim to be
following.
This book thus sets out to fill an important lacuna in the literature,
providing a comparative look at the development model of these three
countries. With Xi Jinping at the 19th Party Congress in 2017 claiming
that China is ready to take on the role as a model for other countries, it is
now more relevant than ever to take a closer analytical look at the socialist
market economy construct. During the global financial crisis in 2007–
2009, Beijing refrained from engaging in the debate about whether the
so-called China Model was a more sustainable and development-friendly
model than the market-liberal Washington Consensus . The leadership of Xi
Jinping is less modest. On several occasions, Xi has suggested that other
developing countries can adopt China’s growth model. In a world in
dire need of new role models, can the Asian ‘socialist market economies’
provide a realistic alternative for other developing countries? If Beijing is
now willing to put money and resources into ‘exporting’ its development
model as part of an expanded south–south dialogue, an in-depth compar-
ative examination of the socialist market economy models of China,
Vietnam and Laos carries great significance.
We do not seek to elaborate or examine in depth the reasons for
the relative success of the development models of China, Vietnam and
Laos. Rather, the main purpose of the authors of this book is to further
our understanding of what the socialist market economy construct is,
in theory and practice. What features do the development models of
China, Vietnam and Laos share and how do they differ? Are the devel-
opments in these three countries yet another example of Asian state-led
developmentalism or something else completely?
Furthermore, are there any promises of more sustainable development
models embedded in their nominally socialist projects? With all three
countries increasingly integrated in the capitalist global economy, to what
extent are these party states still pursuing a state-driven development? And
how much socialism is actually left in these three countries beyond lofty
party rhetoric? Finally, how has the state–society relationship developed;
in terms of labour, social policies and equality, and what is the role of the
emerging middle classes in these countries?
This introductory chapter briefly presents the main developments in

China, Vietnam and Laos over the recent decades and their performance
on economic and social indicators, and discusses to what extent they are
‘development success stories’. It furthermore places these cases in the
literature on development as well as in the contemporary world economy.
It discusses the socialist market economy in relation to theories on the
developmental state and other forms of state-led developmentalism, as
well as in relation to regional economic integration and production
networks. The chapter ends by outlining how the respective chapters in
the book contribute to address the overarching issues in our analysis.
The Socialist Market Economies

as Success Stories of Development
Despite significant local variation, China, Vietnam and Laos have overall
all seen similar development trajectories, including experiments with
planned economies, collectivization of agriculture and a wide range of
social policies. Although these pre-reform developments are important
to take into account for understanding later achievements, they all also
have in common significant bursts in economic growth following market
reforms. And although many major changes happened at earlier and
later stages, the Gaige kaifang (‘Reform and opening up’) in China
(1978/1979), Doi moi (‘Renovation’) in Vietnam (1986) and Chin
Thanakaan Mai (‘New Thinking’) or ‘New Economic Mechanism’ in
Laos (1986) represented the official start of transformations with vast
consequences for domestic economies and the everyday lives of people.
During the three decades of 1989–2018 China had an average annual
GDP per capita growth of 8.4%. This was the third fastest growth of
the countries listed by the World Bank. Vietnam ranked as number five
with 5.4% average growth, and Laos ranked as number six with 5.1%
average growth.1 With sustained very high growth rates over a period
of three decades, coupled with rapid growth of industrial productivity,
China has become the world’s second largest economy and the largest
manufacturer (Naughton 2018). Vietnam and Laos had somewhat lower,
1 Calculated based on data.worldbank.org.

Fig. 1.1 Annual GDP per capita growth: China 1978–2017, Laos/Vietnam:
1985–2017 (Source data.worldbank.org)
but still impressive growth rates (Fig. 1.1). Vietnam has been transformed
from one of Asia’s poorest countries to an ‘emerging economy’ (Hansen
2015). Vietnam and Laos are now both classified as lower middle-income
countries, according to the World Bank classification, although Laos is
still also on the UN’s list of the world’s least developed countries. China
is classified as an upper middle-income country (World Bank 2018a).2 It
took South Korea and Taiwan, widely regarded as the two most impres-
sive success stories in terms of economic development, 19 years to grow
from lower middle income to upper middle income. It took China only
17 years to achieve the same, in 2009.
Although growth somewhat slowed down in the 2010s, they main-
tained comparatively high growth levels (IMF 2019a). According to the
International Monetary Fund (IMF), China’s GDP will continue growing
2 For the 2019 fiscal year, low-income economies are defined as those with a GNI per
capita of $995 or less in 2017; lower middle-income economies are those with a GNI per
capita between $996 and $3895; upper middle-income economies are those with a GNI
per capita between $3896 and $12,055; high-income economies are those with a GNI
per capita of $12,056 or more.
at an annual rate of 5–6% over the 2020–2024 period, for Vietnam annual
GDP growth is estimated to be 6.5%, for Laos 6–7% (IMF 2019a).
While the three countries have seen relatively similar growth trends,
however, they differ significantly on other development indicators. Take
poverty reduction, where China and Vietnam represent a kind of
uncrowned world champions (Banik and Hansen 2016). China’s success
story is now estimated to have lifted 800 million people out of abso-
lute poverty since the market reforms began (World Bank 2018b), while
Vietnam’s development has seen more than 45 million people escape
absolute poverty in the first two decades of the 2000s alone (World Bank
2020). Laos, on the other hand, has seen significant poverty reduction,
but nothing resembling its neighbours. All three countries have achieved
impressive results on a wide range of development indicators (Table 1.1).
Inequality has increased in all three countries during the reform period.
China’s average Gini coefficient for the 2010–2015 period at 42.2 was
slightly higher than that of the United States, which has the highest
inequality of the OECD countries. Inequality was lower in Vietnam and
Table 1.1 Measuring development in the socialist market economy
China China Vietnam Vietnam Laos Laos

1990 2017 1990 2017 1990 2017
GDP/capita/PPP 987 16,807 939 6775 1103 7023

(current
international $)
Absolute poverty (% 66.6 0.7 52.9 2 (2016) 32.2 22.7
of pop below 1.90 (2015) (1992) (1992) (2012)
USD)
Human 0.502 0.752 0.475 0.694 0.400 0.601
development index
Infant mortality 42.1 8 37 16.7 106.1 48.6
(per 1000 live
births)
Maternal mortality 97 27 139 54 905 197
(per 100,000 live
births) 2015
numbers
Literacy (adult total, 77.8 95 87.6 93.5 60 58
ages 15 and above) (2010) (1989) (2009) (1995) (2011)
Access to electricity 92.2 100 74.1 100 15.3 87.1
(% of pop, 2016)
Source World Development Indicators and Human Development Index

Laos in the same 2010–2015 period, however, at about the same levels
as the two EU countries Spain and Portugal (UNDP 2016: 206–207).
China and Vietnam represent development success stories to a large
extent, Laos does to some extent. As is discussed in subsequent chap-
ters, two significant exceptions in all three cases are political freedom and
environmental sustainability. The next section discusses what a socialist
market economy is, and how it has developed in these three countries.
What Is a Socialist Market Economy?

Even if Hsu (2011: 16) might be right in claiming that ‘Economic-
success-oriented pragmatism’ trumps ideology in the socialist market
economy, we should still take notice of the claim forwarded by the
communist parties in China, Vietnam and Laos that they are adopting
a form of socialist orientation in their policies. Let us first look at how
the socialist market economy model is presented in the official rhetoric in
the three countries.
The regimes in all three countries in different ways refer to a combi-
nation of socialism and market economy, but often using different terms.
In China it is usually referred to ‘socialism with Chinese characteristics’,
in Vietnam a ‘market economy with socialist orientation’ or ‘socialist-
oriented market economy’. In China and Laos the term ‘socialist market
economy’ is also used, something that is less common in Vietnam.
Party leader Jiang Zemin’s report to the 14th National Congress of
the Communist Party of China (CPC) in October 1992 was the first
time the Chinese leadership publicly declared that the target of China’s
economic restructuring was a ‘socialist market economy’. Jiang, however,
clearly positioned the term ‘socialist market economy’ within the larger
framework of ‘building socialism with Chinese characteristics’ introduced
by Deng Xiaoping at the 12th Party Congress in 1982, and the purpose
all along was to adopt elements of market economy to foster economic
growth (Miller 2018; Gilley 1998). The content and interpretation of
these two interlinked terms—‘socialist market economy’ and ‘socialism
with Chinese characteristics’, have gradually evolved. In a speech at the
80th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)
in 2001, Jiang Zemin added his ‘Three Represents’ doctrine, calling for
private entrepreneurs to be admitted into the Party (Fewsmith 2003).
The latest political theory of ‘Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with
Chinese Characteristics for a New Era’ adopted at the 19th Party
Congress in 2017, incorporated into the Constitution of the Communist

Party of China, is a continuation of Deng’s legacy of ‘building socialism
with Chinese characteristics’. In his speech to the 19th Party Congress,
Xi introduced a set of cardinal principles, among which were strength-
ening party authority and discipline, and to practice socialist core values,
including Marxism. Nonetheless, in the same speech, Xi also empha-
sized the importance for China to develop the public and the non-public
sector, to move Chinese industries up the global value chain, foster new
growth areas, inspire and protect entrepreneurship, and to make China
a country of innovators (Xinhua 2017). Important yardsticks within the
Chinese socialist market economy construct are the two centenary goals
of building a ‘moderately well-off society’ by 2021 (the anniversary of the
founding of the CCP), and a ‘modern socialist country’ by the time of the
People’s Republic of China’s 100th anniversary in 2049 (Miller 2018).
Vietnam officially adopted the socialist-oriented market economy at
the 9th Party congress in 2001. In the 2013 amended constitution, this
was inscribed in the following manner: ‘The Vietnamese economy is a
socialist-oriented market economy with multi-forms of ownership and
multi-sectors of economic structure; the state economic sector plays the
leading role’. The socialist market economy is something new, official
rhetoric has it. This is not capitalism, the story goes, but rather the appli-
cation of the market economy as a tool for development rather than
a social system. In Vietnam, the model is seen as socialist because of
ownership, organization of management and distribution. To quote the
government-run Vietnam Law & Legal Forum (2015):
The socialist-oriented market economy in Vietnam is a type of organization

of the economy based on not only the principles and rules of a market
economy but also the principles and characteristics of socialism shown in
three aspects: ownership, organization of management and distribution.
The embrace of the market has all along been framed as a strategy to
support national development. And while market reforms have deepened
and also cadres often are involved in private businesses, and amid reports
of party decay (Vu 2014), the leading role of the party remains unchal-
lenged. This role was reaffirmed at the 12th Party Congress in Vietnam,
when a new and ostensibly simpler, definition of the socialist-oriented
market economy was used:
an economy operating fully and synchronously according to the rule of a

market economy while ensuring the socialist orientation suitable to each
period of national development. It is a modern and internationally inte-
grated market economy which is administered by a law-ruled socialist state
and led by the Communist Party of Vietnam toward the goal of a rich
people and a developed, democratic, equal and civilized society. (Vietnam
Law & Legal Forum 2015)
The regime has in many ways grown ‘business-friendly’ (Reed 2019). For
example, it has opened up for party membership for private entrepreneurs,
and has a strong focus on stimulating investments from domestic and
foreign private capital. At the same time, however, and as a useful
reminder to anyone expecting political reforms in Vietnam, the regime
also recently decided that private businesses need stronger party pres-
ence in the form of party cells (Vietnam News 2019). The constitutional
ideology of Vietnam remains Marxism–Leninism combined with ‘Ho Chi
Minh Thought’, and Vietnam is officially simultaneously both a socialist
country and developing towards socialism.
In Laos there is less direct reference to a particular development model
and what it might entail. But the most recent ‘Five-year national socio-
economic development plan’ states as a goal that the country by 2030
‘systematically follows a socialist market economy’ (Ministry of Planning
and Investment 2016: 86). Furthermore, the plan summarizes one of the
main lessons learnt from macroeconomic management so far: ‘[s]ocio-
economic development based on a market economy mechanism that is
managed and regulated by the Government with a comprehensive system
is a key for the development of socialist orientation’ (Ministry of Planning
and Investment 2016: 77).
Simultaneously, while noting the importance of socialism in practice,
socialism is also the goal of development in Laos as well. As put in the
five-year plan 2011–2015: ‘For Lao PDR, the shift to industrialisation
and modernisation is a way forward, and part of the development process
and the only way to lift the country out its least developed country status
and enter a socialist era’ (Lao PDR, five-year plan 2011–2015). Similar
statements are found in Chinese and Vietnamese state documents. Now,
we turn from local conceptualizations of the ‘socialist market economy’
to trying to make sense of this particular development model in the
development literature.
What Kind of Development Model?

There have been many attempts at defining China’s development model,
whether it is ‘State Capitalism’ (Naughton and Tsai 2015), ‘Crony Capi-
talism’ (Pei 2016), ‘Sino-capitalism’ (McNally 2012), ‘capitalism with
Chinese characteristics’ (Huang 2008) or ‘Beijing Consensus’ (Ramo
2004), the latter representing an alternative to the more neoliberal ‘Wash-
ington Consensus’. Arrighi (2007) has argued that China may soon be the
kind of non-capitalist market economy that Adam Smith once described.
Blank (2015) notes that the People’s Republic of China may be a non-
capitalist market alternative, albeit one that is hardly edifying for socialists.
Others have observed that market reforms in China are leading towards a
capitalist and foreign-dominated development path, with enormous social
and political costs, both domestically in China as well as internationally
(Hart-Landsberg and Burkett 2005). Vietnam’s development model has
been labelled as ‘market-Leninism’ (London 2017, this volume), ‘state
capitalism with a Leninist orientation’ (Hansen 2015) and as yet another
example of an Asian state developmentalism (Beeson and Pham 2012). At
the same time, despite their stated socialist orientations, all three coun-
tries are frequently portrayed as both ‘post-socialist’ and neoliberal. The
reason behind these quite different and often opposing labels may be the
complexity and the many contradictions embedded in the socialist market
economy.
While many developments in China, as well as in Vietnam and Laos,
can be labelled as neoliberal (see for example Kenney-Lazar 2019;
Schwenkel and Leshkowich 2012; Nonini 2008), such as for example the
privatization of public services, labelling the ‘socialist market economy’
as neoliberal is in many ways a stretch (Weber 2018). Although all three
countries have clearly moved away from the planned economy and are
both decentralizing and deregulating the economy, the states in different
ways still have a strong hand in the economy, and the ruling parties are
involved in every sector of society. For example, despite the rise of private
business in China (Lardy 2014; Tsai 2007), state-owned banks continue
to favour state-owned enterprises (SOEs) above private enterprises (IMF
2019b), and even privatized SOE’s continue to benefit from government
support relative to private enterprises (Harrison et al. 2019). In addition,
strategic industries in China remain firmly in the grasp of an ‘elite empire
of state-owned enterprises’ (Naughton and Tsai 2015). Similar trends are
obvious in Vietnam.
Many have compared China and Vietnam to the East Asian devel-
opmental states, some also refer to them as examples of developmental
states (UNDP 2013). Others have argued they are in fact variations
of neoliberalism (Harvey 2005), while others again locate them some-
where between developmental states and neoliberalism (Masina 2012;
Hsu 2011). However, as Jonathan London discusses more in detail in
his chapter in this volume, it is quite clear, that these countries do not
represent just another example of the old East Asian success recipe of
the developmental state (see Wade 2018 for a recent overview). It is not
the strong developmental state as seen in for example South Korea that
we see here, although they share some of the traits of long-term plan-
ning. In the mid-1990s, a few years after the launch of doi moi, it was
observed that Vietnamese authorities had to strengthen their capacity
to handle market economy reforms (Scholtes and Thanh 1996). Later,
Gainsborough (2010) has argued that the Vietnamese state is strong in
terms of policing society, but still weak when it comes to implementing
economic development plans. Ohno (2009: 35) finds that Vietnam lacks
clear strategies and action plans, the ‘hallmark of East Asian industrial-
ization’, while Pincus (2015: 29) finds that the Vietnamese state ‘did
not withdraw but rather commercialized itself to take advantage of the
opportunities associated with expanding markets’, in the process leading
to the breaking down of vertical authority relations and horizontal coor-
dination. Hsu (2011) makes similar observations in China, finding that
the ‘central government’s institutional capacity has been simply too weak
to pursue the East Asian style of industrial policy’ (5) and argues that
‘The state’s ultimate role […] is to be comprehended as to nurture and
accelerate marketization, liberalization, and privatization, rather than to
replace them’ (4). Thus, rather than a developmental state, he argues,
China is a ‘market-enhancing state’ (Hsu 2011: 7).
Rather than industrial policy for developing home-grown manufac-
turing, the reliance on FDI is much higher in China and Vietnam than
it was in the developmental states (Masina 2015; Hsu 2011), especially
when it comes to exports. For instance, eight out of the top ten exporting
firms in China in 2015 were foreign owned (Starrs 2018: 189). Vietnam’s
manufacturing sector is mainly driven by foreign direct investment (FDI),
which accounts for close to 90% of the country’s manufacturing exports
(Eckardt et al. 2018). While state capacities may be lower than within the
developmental states, and reliance on foreign direct investment is higher,
the socialist market economies have to a considerable extent retained their
control of ‘the commanding heights of the economy’. In all three coun-

tries, the financial system is dominated by state-owned banks, and in spite
of past and present privatization programmes, state-owned enterprises are
still major players in their economies.
The introduction of market elements into the three communist states
of China, Vietnam and Laos have been gradual, in contrast to the
‘shock therapy’ of market reforms unleashed in Russia and the Eastern
European countries after the collapse of the Soviet Union (Naughton
2018; Pei 2006; Tompson 2002; Gerber and Hout 1998). It is argued
that the evolutionary approach in general holds the better prospect of
generating economic progress that will be sustained over the long term
(Murrell 1992).3 China’s gradual approach to economic reforms is well-
known (Naughton 2018; Vogel 2013), but the transition towards market
economies have been gradual also in Laos and Vietnam (Chheang and
Wong 2014; Guo 2006). Vietnam shifted towards a more market-based
economy using a trial-and-error approach, with a gradual recognition of
the important contribution of private initiative to economic development
(Vandemoortele and Bird 2011), and it is argued that Vietnam’s ‘cau-
tious and sequenced adoption of market institutions has brought more
than two decades of impressive economic performance’ (Busch 2017: 1).
Nevertheless, it is important to note that the gradual and evolutionary
introduction of market reforms in China, Vietnam and Laos have not
been linear. Instead of marching steadily towards more market and less
state intervention, each country has faced crossroads where they have
halted, turned or even reversed the process. For instance, the political
turmoil in China in 1989 almost put an end to the economic reform
process (Vogel 2013). The rapid liberalization and globalization of the
world financial industry in the 1990s contributed to the Asian financial
crisis in the late 1990s in unprepared emerging markets, leading to a
growing degree of scepticism and debate about further market reforms
in all the socialist market economies (Wade 2004; Stiglitz and Yusuf
2001). Huang Yasheng (2008) has argued that policies facilitating an
3 Alternative explanations have been presented, that the ‘weighted combination’ of

macroeconomic and microeconomic reforms in China can be regarded as true ‘shock
therapy’, while the Russian reforms despite initial macro-financial shock have been slow
and inconsistent and, for that reason, less successful than in China (See Kazakevitch,
Gennadi and Russell Smyth 2005. Gradualism Versus Shock Therapy: (Re)Interpreting
the Chinese and Russian Experiences. Asia Pacific Business Review 11 (1): 69–81).
entrepreneurial spirit in rural China in the 1980s were reversed and

overtaken by more urban-centred and state-controlled reforms in the
1990s. Private businesses have since flourished in China, and play a major
role in China’s economic growth (Lardy 2014). Still, it seems the state
is striking back once more, as Xi Jinping lately has championed state-
owned enterprises at the expense of private entrepreneurs (Lardy 2019).
Throughout the reform process in China, decentralization has often been
followed by new forms of state interventions, in the market as well as
in the society at large (Fewsmith 2016; Zheng and Weng 2016). Similar
developments have been seen in Vietnam. While new and very powerful
private corporations have emerged, these are in complex ways connected
to the party state (see Reed 2019). Furthermore, despite the ‘equitisa-
tion’ of a large number of state-owned enterprises, they still dominate all
sectors seen as strategic by the state. The party anyways often remains
influential also in ‘equitised’ enterprises and, as pointed out above, the
party is now seeking to strengthen its presence in the private sector. In
other words, the ‘socialist market economy’ construct is not constant, or
heading uninterrupted in one specific direction, but it is rather in constant
flux, between more or less market, state and society, shaped by domestic
and international events and trends.
Varieties of Socialist Market Economies

The aim of this book is not to argue that the ‘socialist market economy’
in China, Vietnam and Laos should be understood as one coherent model
for development. We acknowledge the fundamental differences between
these three countries, in terms of culture, history, the level of develop-
ment, and certainly in terms of wealth and power. There is a vast literature
discussing the role of culture on development (Woolcock 2014), and its
impact on political systems and strategy (Schwartz 1996; Johnston 1995)
as well as on economy and business systems (Whitley 1992). One of the
most debated cultural legacies in terms of its potential impact on business
and development is that of Confucianism (Hahm and Paik 2003; Kim
1997), and while China and Vietnam belong to the ‘Confucian cultural
sphere’, Laos does not. Put simply, even though both Vietnam and Laos
are considered Southeast Asian countries, Vietnam has culturally more in
common with Northeast Asia, particularly China.
Moreover, the starting point of the comprehensive market reforms
in China in the late 1970s differed from that of Laos and Vietnam,
normally dated to 1986. When China launched the reform process, it

already had a large, state-owned heavy industry sector, and it had devel-
oped local industry in rural centres in the 1970s (Naughton 2018).
In contrast, the market reforms of Vietnam emerged from economic
crisis. Vietnam was reunified in 1975–1976 after independence wars with
France, a long period of North–South separation and what is known in
Vietnam as ‘the American War’. Vietnam did not have any significant
manufacturing base prior to the market reforms. Heavy-handed efforts to
integrate the previous non-communist South into the planned economy
failed. Diplomatic isolation, economic sanctions, declining foreign aid and
the high costs of Vietnam’s occupation of Cambodia made the situation
worse (Fforde and de Vylder 1996; Fforde 1999). Laos faced an even
graver economic crisis than Vietnam in 1987–1988. Like in Vietnam, the
economy was weakened by war before the communist Pathet Lao seized
power in 1975. The new socialist economy struggled with failed efforts
at Soviet-style economic planning and economic socialization along with
diplomatic isolation, sanctions and declining aid (Rosser 2006).
Vietnam and China were integrated into the regional ‘Flying Geese’
order of regional export-oriented manufacturing production. Foreign
investors from previous ‘generations’ of industrializing countries in the
region, such as Japan and the ‘East Asian NICs’ (Taiwan, South Korea,
Hong Kong and Singapore) invested in labour-intensive manufacturing in
new generations, mainly for exports to Western markets. The initial posi-
tions of China and Vietnam in this regional order were relatively similar,
but China was to a larger extent than Vietnam able to improve its posi-
tion in the regional production hierarchy through economic upgrading
of its export-manufacturing industry (Naughton 2018; Masina 2015;
Masina and Cerimele 2018). Unlike China, Vietnam also relied on foreign
earnings from agricultural exports and tourism.
In contrast, the small population and landlocked position of Laos were
major impediments to industrialisation by import substitution as well as
by export orientation. Its integration into the regional economy from the
1990s on was characterized by resource-based exports, including hydro-
power energy to neighbour countries, coffee and wood products. The
tourist industry of Laos is also on the rise (Asian Development Bank
2017).
In result, there are significant differences in the current structures of
their economies. China and Vietnam have maintained a focus on industry
with export manufacturing sectors that are strongly integrated into the
international economy. Laos diverted from that path, and has instead
developed a highly extractivist economy based on natural resources. In
addition, there are also great variations in development and economic
structures within each of the three countries. China’s export manufac-
turing has mainly been located in the southern coastal provinces, while
its western interior has lagged behind in terms of economic growth. In
Vietnam, the Mekong Delta region has been more entrepreneurial and
private enterprise-based than the more state-controlled Red River Delta in
the north. Nonetheless, despite these national and local variations within
the ‘socialist market economy’ we find that a comparative look at these
three countries and their development model can provide us with useful
insight.
Making Sense of the Socialist Market

Economy: Outline of the Book
The book consists of four main parts. Part I considers the socialist
market economy as a development model, and includes this introduc-
tory chapter. In the following chapter, Jo Inge Bekkevold puts our cases
into an international context, considering how the international level has
shaped economic governance and development in China, Vietnam and
Laos. Following that, Jonathan London argues China and Vietnam can
be understood as varieties of ‘Market Leninism’. The two countries, he
argues, exhibit social relational and institutional attributes that are distinc-
tive in relation to all other actually existing varieties of capitalism, and can
be understood as distinctive kinds of social formations defined by polit-
ical settlements founded on the wedding of globally linked markets with
Leninist political institutions.
Part II of the book zooms in on state and market relations in the
socialist market economies and implications for economic and environ-
mental governance. China, Vietnam and Laos have within the frame
of 2–3 decades gone through rapid shifts in their respective economic
models. This comprehensive and rapid transformation of their respec-
tive economies—although to different degrees—challenges the regulatory
apparatus in each country to adapt to new requirements, and raises
important questions with regard to the role of the state and the market
in developmental states. Bui Hai Thiem analyses the party state from
a governance perspective and how the concept of the socialist market
economy creates tensions and contradictions. First providing an overview
of the development of the party state in China and Vietnam, the chapter
proceeds to consider some of its key institutional features and chal-
lenges, as well as its prospects for future survival. In their chapter, Hege
Merete Knutsen and Do Ta Khanh consider the reforms of state-owned
enterprises in Vietnam. Shedding light on contradictions between the
Vietnamese socialist ideology and the market imperative and international
pressure the Vietnamese economy is subject to as a global player, the
chapter focuses mainly on the new phase of SOE reforms starting around
2016. Robert Cole and Micah L. Ingalls then take us to the country-
side. Rural development is deeply rooted in the revolutionary origins
of the socialist market economies. This chapter considers the cases of
Vietnam and Laos, and analyses how rural development fares in the new
market economy and the regimes’ focus on ‘green growth’. Focusing
on social and environmental sustainability, the chapter explores the new
rural development dynamics in the context of a socialist alliance ideologi-
cally founded on bringing about equality of life opportunity to the many,
but more often in practice skewed towards opportunistic gain for the
few. In his chapter, Stephan Ortmann investigates the Vietnamese party
state’s attempts to handle mounting environmental problems. Vietnam’s
authorities have cooperated with international organizations and NGOs
to develop environmental political programmes and legislation. However,
implementation of policies and legislation is poor as the government’s
capacity is limited and the authoritarian party state pursues an ineffective
top-down approach to environmental governance.
Part III focuses on state and society relations, investigating the social
changes and continuations within the processes of rapid economic devel-
opment in China, Vietnam and Laos. If, as the official story goes, the
aim is to construct a socialist society using the market economy as a tool,
questions of class, inequality and welfare are obviously fundamental to the
socialist market economy. But while the three countries tend to outper-
form countries at similar income levels on social and material development
indicators, social polarization, labour conflicts and dramatic inequalities in
income, welfare and access to services are also a central part of contem-
porary development in these three countries. These trends raise crucial
questions concerning both the credibility and the sustainability of the
socialist market economy.
Arve Hansen focuses on the rapidly expanding middle classes in China
and Vietnam. The chapter launches the term ‘consumer socialism’ to
capture developments in these two countries, and studies the socialist
middle classes through the particular political-economic contexts that

have fostered them as well as the consumption patterns that define them.
In doing so, it seeks to understand what consumer socialism is, how
it fits into the visions of the socialist market economy, and whether
consumer socialism is something different from the capitalist consumer
society. Kristen Nordhaug looks at labour conflicts in China and Vietnam,
focusing especially on export-manufacturing centres located in the south
of the two countries. While sharing many similarities, such as high
prevalence of unskilled labour and party-state-controlled labour unions,
Nordhaug finds that strike frequency is significantly higher in Vietnam
than in China. The chapter considers the possible explanations for this
difference, looking at work organization, living arrangements, labour
legislation and governance responses to collective labour demands. In the
subsequent chapter, Kristin Dalen zooms in on Chinese social policy and
the attempts to build a new welfare state. Approaching these changes in
the context of Xi Jinping’s ‘core socialist values’, Dalen considers systems
of insurance, pensions and basic education, locating both achievements
and challenges. The chapter then provides possible lessons for the devel-
opment of welfare states in the two other socialist market economies.
All the chapters to some extent touch on the contradictions involved in
introducing capitalist logics to achieve socialism. Boike Rehbein argues
that in Laos only a small part of the elite has truly embraced capitalism
while a somewhat larger share still conforms with old socialist values. The
majority of the population, however, adheres to lifestyles and livelihood
strategies preceding the introduction of both socialism and capitalism to
the country. Rehbein studies how the rapid spread of the spirit of capi-
talism, also within the party leadership itself, is beginning to weaken the
control by the party and what the consequences of this might be.
The fourth and last part of the book draws on the many different
perspectives presented in the different chapters to assess the development
model of the socialist market economy. More than a mere summary, the
chapter aims to answer some of the fundamental questions and issues
raised by developments in China, Vietnam and Laos over the past three
or four decades. Quite simply, yet ambitiously, it tries to make sense of
the socialist market economy.
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uses; and that according to the various purposes they are applied,
&c. Therefore, indeed, a Letter-Cutter should have a Forge set up,
as by Numb. 1. But some Letter-Cutters may seem to scorn to use a
Forge, as accounting it too hard Labour, and Ungenteel for
themselves to officiate at. Yet they all well know, that though they
may have a common Black-Smith perform their much and heavy
Work, that many times a Forge of their own at Hand would be very
commodious for them in several accidental little and light Jobs,
which (in a Train of Work) they must meet withal.
But if our Letter-Cutter will have no Forge, yet he must of necessity
accommodate himself with a Vice, Hand-Vice, Hammers, Files,
Small and Fine Files (commonly called Watch-makers Files) of these
he saves all, as they wear out, to smooth and burnish the Sides and
Face of his Letter with, as shall be shewed; Gravers, and Sculpters
of all sorts, an Anvil, or a Stake, an Oyl-stone, &c. And of these,
such as are suitable and sizable to the several Letters he is to Cut.
These, or many of these Tools, being described in Numb. 1. I refer
my Reader thither, and proceed to give an account of some Tools
peculiar to the Letter-Cutter, though not of particular use to the
Common Black-Smith.
Plate 10.
¶. 2. Of the Using-File.
This File is about nine or ten Inches long, and three or four Inches
broad, and three quarters of an Inch thick: The two broad sides must
be exactly flat and straight: And the one side is commonly cut with a
Bastard-Cut, the other with a Fine or Smooth Cut. (See Numb. 1.
Fol. 14, 15.) Its use is to Rub a piece of Steel, Iron, or Brass, &c. flat
and straight upon, as shall be shewed hereafter.
In chusing it, you must see it be exactly Flat and Straight all its
Length and Breadth: For if it in any part Belly out, or be Hollow
inwards, what is Rubbed upon it will be Hollow, Rubbing on the
Bellying part; and Bellying, Rubbing on the Hollow part. You must
also see that it be very Hard; and therefore the thickest Using-Files
are likeliest to prove best, because the thin commonly Warp in
Hardning.
¶. 3. Of the Flat-Gage.
The Flat-Gage is described in Plate 10. at A. It is made of a flat piece

of Box, or other Hard Wood. Its Length is three Inches and an half,
its Breadth two Inches and an half, and its Thickness one Inch and
an half. This is on the Flat, first made Square, but afterwards hath
one of its Corners (as h) a little rounded off, that it may the easier
comply with the Ball of the Hand. Out of one of its longest Sides, viz.
that not rounded off, is Cut through the thickness of it an exact
Square, whose one side b f, c g is about an Inch and three quarters
long; and its other side b d, c e about half an Inch long. The Depth of
these Sides and their Angle is exactly Square to the top and bottom
of the upper and under Superficies of the Flat-Gage.
Its Use is to hold a Rod of Steel, or Body of a Mold, &c. exactly
perpendicular to the Flat of the Using-File, that the end of it may rub
upon the Using-File, and be Filed away exactly Square, and that to
the Shank; as shall more at large be shewed in §. 2. ¶. 3.
¶. 4. Of the Sliding-Gage.
The Sliding-Gage is described in Plate 10. at Fig. B. It is a Tool

commonly used by Mathematical Instrument-Makers, and I have
found it of great use in Letter-Cutting, and making of Molds, &c. a a
the Beam, b the Tooth, c c the Sliding Socket, d d d d the Shoulder
of the Socket.
Its Use is to measure and set off Distances between the Sholder and
the Tooth, and to mark it off from the end, or else from the edge of
your Work.
I always use two or three of these Gages, that I need not remove the
Sholder when it is set to a Distance which I may have after-use for;
as shall in Working be shewed more fully.
¶. 5. Of the Face-Gages, marked C in Plate 10.
The Face-Gage is a Square Notch cut with a File into the edge of a
thin Plate of Steel, Iron, or Brass, the thickness of a piece of
common Latton, and the Notch about an English deep. There be
three of these Gages made, for the Letters to be cut on one Body;
but they may be all made upon one thin Plate, the readier to be
found, as at D. As first, for the Long Letters; Secondly, for the
Assending Letters; And Thirdly, for the Short-Letters. The Length of
these several Notches, or Gages, have their Proportions to the Body
they are cut to, and are as follows. We shall imagine (for in Practice
it cannot well be perform’d, unless in very large Bodies) that the
Length of the whole Body is divided into forty and two equal Parts.
The Gage for the Long-Letters are the length of the whole Body, viz.
forty and two equal Parts. The Gage for the Assending Letters,
Roman and Italica, are five Seventh Parts of the Body, viz. thirty
Parts of forty-two, and thirty and three Parts for English Face. The
Gage for the Short-Letters are three Seventh Parts of the whole
Body, viz. eighteen Parts of forty-two for the Roman and Italica, and
twenty two Parts for the English Face.
It may indeed be thought impossible to divide a Body into seven
equal Parts, and much more difficult to divide each of those seven
equal Parts into six equal Parts, which are forty-two, as aforesaid,
especially if the Body be but small; but yet it is possible with curious
Working: For seven thin Spaces may be Cast and Rubb’d to do it.
And for dividing each of the thin Spaces into six equal Parts, you
may Cast and Rub Full Point . to be of the thickness of one thin
Space, and one sixth part of a thin Space: And you may Cast and
Rub : to be the thickness of one thin Space, and two sixth parts of a
thin Space: And you may Cast and Rub , to be the thickness of one
thin Space, and three sixth parts of a thin Space: And you may Cast
and Rub - to be the thickness of one thin Space, and four sixth parts
of a thin Space: And you may Cast and Rub ; to be the thickness of
one thin Space, and five sixth parts of a thin Space.
The reason why I propose . to be Cast and Rubb’d one sixth part
thicker than a thin Space, is only that it may be readily distinguished
from : , - ; which are two sixth parts, three sixth parts, four sixth
parts, five sixth parts thicker than a thin Space. And for six sixth parts
thicker than a thin Space, two thin Spaces does it.
The manner of adjusting these several Sixth Parts of Thicknesses is
as follows. You may try if six . exactly agree, and be even with seven
thin Spaces; (or, which is all one, a Body) for then is each of those
six . one sixth part thicker than a thin Space, because it drives out a
thin Space in six thin Spaces. And you may try if six : be equal to a
Body and one thin Space; for then is each : two sixth parts thicker
than a thin Space. If six , be equal to nine thin Spaces, then each , is
three sixth parts of a thin Space thicker than a thin Space. If six - be
equal to ten thin Spaces, then each - is four sixth parts of a thin
Space thicker than a thin Space. If six ; be equal to eleven thin
Spaces, then each ; is five sixth parts of a thin Space thicker than a
thin Space.
Now, as aforesaid, a thin Space being one seventh part of the Body,
and the thin Space thus divided, you have the whole Body actually
divided into forty and two equal parts, as I have divided them in my
Drafts of Letters down the Sides, and in the Bottom-Line.
Though I have thus shewed how to divide a thin Space into six equal
Parts, yet when the Letter to be Cut proves of a small Body, the thin
Space divided into two equal Parts may serve: If it prove bigger, into
three or four equal Parts: And of the largest Bodies, they may be
divided into six, as aforesaid.
If now you would make a Gage for any number of thin Spaces and
Sixth Parts of a thin Space, you must take one thin Space less than
the number of thin Spaces proposed, and add . : , - ; according as
the number of sixth Parts of a thin Space require; and to those
complicated Thicknesses you may file a square Notch on the edge of
the thin Plate aforesaid, which shall be a standing Gage or Measure
for that number of thin Spaces and sixth Parts of a thin Space.
All the Exception against this way of Measuring is, that thin Spaces
cast in Metal may be subject to bow, and so their Thicknesses may
prove deceitful. But, in Answer to that, I say, you may, if you will,
Cast I for two thin Spaces thick, e for three thin Spaces thick, S for
four thin Spaces thick, L for five thin Spaces thick, D for six thin
Spaces thick, or any other Letters near these several Thicknesses,
as you think fit; only remember, or rather, make a Table of the
number of thin Spaces that each Letter on the Shank is Cast for. And
by complicating the Letters and Points, as aforesaid, you will have
any Thickness, either to make a Gage by, or to use otherwise.
On the other Edge of the Face-Gage you may file three other
Notches, of the same Width with those on the former Edge, for the
Long, the Assending, and Short-Letters. But though the two sides of
each of these Notches are parallel to each other, yet is not the third
side square to them, but hath the same Slope the Italick hath from
the Roman; as you may see in the Figure at b b b.
¶. 6. Of Italick, and other Standing Gages.

These Gages are to measure (as aforesaid) the Slope of the Italick
Stems, by applying the Top and Bottom of the Gage to the Top and
Bottom Lines of the Letters, and the other Side of the Gage to the
Stem: for when the Letter complies with these three sides of the
Gage that Letter hath its true Slope.
The manner of making these Gages (and indeed all other Angular
Gages) is thus.
Place one Point of a Pair of Steel Dividers upon the thin Plate
aforesaid, at the Point c or d (in Fig. D in Plate 10.) and with the
other Point describe a small fine Arch of a Circle; as, e f or g h. In
this Arch of the Circle must be set off on the Gage a 110 Degrees,
and on the Gage b 70 Degrees, and draw from the Centres c and d
two straight Lines through those numbers of Degrees: Then Filing
away the Plate between the two Lines, the Gages are finished.
To find the Measure of this, or any other number of Degrees, do
thus; Describe a Circle on a piece of Plate-Brass of any Radius (but
the larger the better) draw a straight Line exactly through the Centre
of this Circle, and another straight Line to cut this straight Line at
right Angles in the Centre, through the Circle; so shall the Circle be
divided into four Quadrants: Then fix one Foot of your Compasses
(being yet unstirr’d) in one of the Points where any of the straight
Lines cuts the Circle, and extend the moving Foot of your
Compasses where it will fall in the Circle, and make there a Mark,
which is 60 Degrees from the fixed Foot of the Compasses: Then fix
again one Foot of your Compasses in the Intersection of the straight
Line and Circle that is next the Mark that was made before, and
extend the moving Foot in the same Quadrant towards the straight
Line where you first pitch’d the Foot of your Compasses, and with
the moving Foot make another Mark in the Circle. These two Marks
divide the Quadrant into three equal Parts: The same way you may
divide the other three Quadrants; so shall the whole Circle be divided
into twelve equal Parts; and each of these twelve equal parts contain
an Arch of thirty Degrees: Then with your Dividers divide each of
these 30 Degrees into three equal Parts, and each of these three
equal Parts into two equal Parts, and each of these two equal Parts
into five equal Parts, so shall the Circle be divided into 360 equal
Parts, for your use.
To use it, describe on the Centre of the Circle an Arch of almost a
Semi-Circle: This Arch must be exactly of the same Radius with that
I prescribed to be made on the Gages a b, from e to f and from g to
h; then count in your Circle of Degrees from any Diametral Line 110
Degrees; and laying a straight Ruler on the Centre, and on the 110
Degrees aforesaid, make a small Mark through the small Arch; and
placing one Foot of your Compasses at the Intersection of the small
Arch, with the Diametral Line, open the other Foot to the Mark made
on the small Arch for 110 Degrees, and transfer that Distance to the
small Arch made on the Gage: Then through the Marks that the two
Points of your Compasses make in the small Arch on the Gage,
draw two straight Lines from the Centre c: and the Brass between
those two straight Lines being filed away, that Gage is made. In like
manner you may set off any other number of Degrees, for the
making of any other Gage.
In like manner, you may measure any Angle in the Drafts of Letters,
by describing a small Arch on the Angular Point, and an Arch of the
same Radius on the Centre of your divided Circle: For then, placing
one Foot of your Compasses at the Intersection of the small Arch
with either of the straight Lines proceeding from the Angle in the
Draft, and extending the other Foot to the Intersection of the small
Arch, with the other straight Line that proceeds from the Angle, you
have between the Feet of your Compasses, the Width of the Angle;
and by placing one Foot of your Compasses at the Intersection of
any of the straight Lines that proceed from the Centre of the divided
Circle, and the small Arch you made on it, and making a Mark where
the other Foot of your Compasses falls in the said small Arch, you
may, by a straight Ruler laid on the Centre of the divided Circle, and
the Mark on the small Arch, see in the Limb of the Circle the number
of Degrees contained between the Diametral, or straight Line and
the Mark.
If you have already a dividing-Plate of 360 Degrees, of a larger
Radius than the Arch on your Gage, you may save your self the
labour of dividing a Circle (as aforesaid,) and work by your dividing-
Plate as you were directed to do with the Circle that I shewed you to
divide.
In these Documents I have exposed my self to a double Censure;
First, of Geometricians: Secondly, of Letter-Cutters. Geometricians
will censure me for writing anew that which almost every young
Beginner knows: And Letter-Cutters will censure me for proposing a
Rule for that which they dare pretend they can do without Rule.
To the Geometricians I cross the Cudgels: yet I writ this not to them;
and I doubt I have written superfluously to Letter-Cutters, because I
think few of them either will or care to take pains to understand these
small Rudiments of Geometry. If they do, and be ingenious, they will
thank me for discovering this Help in their own Way, which few of
them know. For by this Rule they will not only make Letters truer, but
also quicker, and with less care; because they shall never need to
stamp their Counter-Punch in Lead, to see how it pleases them;
which they do many times, before they like their Counter-Punch, (be
it of A A V v W w V W, and several other Letters) and at last finish
their Counter-Punch but with a good Opinion they have that it may
do well, though they frequently see it does not in many Angular
Letters on different Bodies Cut by the same Hand. And were Letter-
Cutting brought to so common Practice as Joynery, Cabinet-making,
or Mathematical Instrument-making, every young Beginner should
then be taught by Rules, as they of these Trades are; because
Letter-Cutting depends as much upon Rule and Compass as any
other Trade does.
You may in other places, where you find most Convenience (as at i)
make a Square, which may stand you in stead for the Squaring the
Face and Stems of the Punch in Roman Letters, and also in many
other Uses.
And you may make Gages, as you were taught before to try the
Counter-Punches of Angular Letters; as, A K M N V X Y Z, Romans
and Italicks, Capitals and Lower-Case. But then, that you may know
each distinct Gage, you may engrave on the several respective
Gages, at the Angle, A A 4 &c. For by examining by the Drafts of
Letters, what Angle their Insides make, you may set that Angle off,
and make the Gage as you were taught before, in the Gage for the
Slope of Italicks.
¶. 7. Of the Liner.
The Liner is marked E in Plate 10. It is a thin Plate of Iron or Brass,

whose Draft is sufficient to express the Shape. The Use of it is on
the under-edge a b (which is about three Inches long) and is made
truly straight, and pretty sharp or fine; that being applied to the Face
of a Punch, or other piece of Work, it may shew whether it be
straight or no.
¶. 8. Of the Flat-Table.
The Flat-Table at F in Plate 10. The Figure is there sufficient. All its
Use is the Table F, for that is about one Inch and an half square, and
on its Superficies exactly straight and flat. It is made of Iron or Brass,
but Brass most proper. Its Use is to try if the Shank of a Punch be
exactly Perpendicular to its Face, when the Face is set upon the
Table; for if the Shank stand then directly upright to the Face of the
Table, and lean not to any side of it, it is concluded to be
perpendicular.
It hath several other Uses, which, when we come to Casting of
Letters, and Justifying of Matrices, shall be shewn.
¶. 9. Of the Tach.
The Tach is a piece of Hard Wood, (Box is very good) about three
Inches broad, six Inches long, and three quarters of an Inch thick.
About half its Length is fastned firm down upon the Work-Bench, and
its other half projects over the hither Edge of it. It hath three or four
Angular Notches on its Fore-end to rest and hold the Shank of a
Punch steady when the End of the Punch is screwed in the Hand-
Vice, and the Hand-Vice held in the left hand, while the Workman
Files or Graves on it with his Right Hand.
Instead of Fastning the Tach to the Bench, I Saw a square piece out
of the further half of the Tach, that it may not be too wide for the
Chaps of the Vice to take and screw that narrow End into the Chaps
of the Vice, because it should be less cumbersome to my Work-
Bench.
¶. 10. Of Furnishing the Work-Bench.
The Workman hath all his great Files placed in Leather Nooses, with
their Handles upwards, that he may readily distinguish the File he
wants from another File. These Nooses are nailed on a Board that
Cases the Wall on his Right Hand, and as near his Vice as
Convenience will admit, that he may the readier take any File he
wants.
He hath also on his Right Hand a Tin Pot, of about a Pint, with small
Files standing in it, with their Handles downwards, that their Blades
may be the readier seen. These small Files are called Watch-makers
Files, and the Letter-Cutter hath occasion to use these of all Shapes,
viz. Flat, Pillar, Square, Triangular, Round, Half-Round, Knife-Files,
&c.
He also provides a shallow square Box, of about five Inches long,
and three Inches broad, to lay his small Instruments in; as, his
Gages, his Liner, some common Punches, &c. This Box he places
before him, at the further side of the Work-Bench.
He also provides a good Oyl-Stone, to sharpen his Gravers and
Sculpters on. This he places at some distance from the Vice, on his
left hand.
§. 13. ¶. 1. Of Letter-Cutting.
The Letter-Cutter does either Forge his Steel-Punches, or procures
them to be forged; as I shewed, Numb. 1. Fol. 8, 9, 10. in Vol. I. &c.
But great care must be taken, that the Steel be sound, and free from
Veins of Iron, Cracks and Flaws, which may be discerned; as I
shewed in Numb. 3. Vol. I. For if there be any Veins of Iron in the
Steel, when the Letter is Cut and Temper’d, and you would Sink the
Punch into the Copper, it will batter there: Or it will Crack or Break if
there be Flaws.
If there be Iron in it, it must with the Chissel be split upon a good
Blood-Red-Heat in that place, and the Iron taken or wrought out; and
then with another, or more Welding Heat, or Heats, well doubled up,
and laboured together, till the Steel become a sound entire piece.
This Operation Smiths call Well Currying of the Steel.
If there be Flaws in it, you must also take good Welding Heats, so
hot, that the contiguous sides of the Flaws may almost Run: for then,
snatching it quickly out of the Fire, you may labour it together till it
become close and sound.
Mr. Robinson, a Black-Smith of Oxford, told me a way he uses that is
ingenious, and seems rational: For if he doubts the Steel may have
some small Flaws that he can scarce discern, he takes a good high
Blood-Red Heat of it, and then twists the Rod or Bar (as I shewed,
Numb. 3. Vol. I.) which Twisting winds the Flaws about the Body of
the Rod, and being thus equally disposed, more or less, into the Out-
sides of the Rod, according as the Position of the Flaw may be,
allows an equal Heat on all sides to be taken, because the Out-sides
heat faster than the Inside and therefore the Out-sides of the Steel
are not thus so subject to Burn, or Run, as if it should be kept in the
Fire till the Middle, or Inside of it should be ready to Run. And when
the Steel is thus well welded, and soundly laboured and wrought
together with proper Heats, he afterwards reduces it to Form.
Now, that I may be the better understood by my Reader as he reads
further, I have, in Plate 10. at Fig. G described the several Parts of
the Punch; which I here explain.
G The Face.
a a, b b The Thickness.
a b, a b The Heighth.
a c, b c, b c The Length of the Shank, about an Inch and
three quarters long.
c c c The Hammer-End.
This is no strict Length for the Shank, but a convenient Length; for
should the Letter Cut on the Face be small, and consequently, the
Shank so too, and the Shank much longer, and it (as seldom it is) not
Temper’d in the middle, it might, with Punching into Copper, bow in
the middle, either with the weight of the Hammer, or with light
reiterated Blows: And should it be much shorter, there might perhaps
Finger-room be wanting to manage and command it while it is
Punching into the Copper. But this Length is long enough for the
biggest Letters, and short enough for the smallest Letters.
The Heighth and Thickness cannot be assign’d in general, because
of the diversity of Bodies, and Thickness of Letters: Besides, some
Letters must be Cut on a broad Face of Steel, though, when it is Cut,
it is of the same Body; as all Letters are, to which Counter-Punches
are used; because the Striking the Counter-Punch into the Face of
the Punch will, if it have not strength enough to contain it, break or
crack one or more sides of the Punch, and so spoil it. But if the
Letter be wholly to be Cut, and not Counter-Punch’d, as I shall
hereafter hint in general what Letters are not, then the Face of the
Punch need be no bigger, or, at least, but a small matter bigger than
the Letter that is to be cut upon it.
Now, If the Letter be to be Counter-punch’d, the Face of the Punch
ought to be about twice the Heighth, and twice the Thickness of the
Face of the Counter-Punch; that so, when the Counter-Punch is
struck just on the middle of the Face of the Punch, a convenient
Substance, and consequently, Strength of Steel on all its Sides may
be contained to resist the Delitation, that the Sholder or Beard of the
Counter-Punch sinking into it, would else make.
If the Letter-Cutter be to Cut a whole Set of Punches of the same
Body of Roman and Italica, he provides about 240 or 260 of these
Punches, because so many will be used in the Roman and Italica
Capitals and Lower-Case, Double-Letters, Swash-Letters, Accented
Letters, Figures, Points, &c. But this number of Punches are to have
several Heighths and Thicknesses, though the Letters to be Cut on
them are all of the same Body.
What Heighth and Thickness is, I have shewed before in this §, but
not what Body is; therefore I shall here explain it.
By Body is meant, in Letter-Cutters, Founders and Printers
Language, the Side of the Space contained between the Top and
Bottom Line of a Long-Letter. As in the Draft of Letters, the divided
Line on the Left-Hand of A is divided into forty and two equal Parts;
and that Length is the Body, thus: J being an Ascending and
Descending Letter, viz. a long Letter, stands upon forty-two Parts,
and therefore fills the whole Body.
There is in common Use here in England, about eleven Bodies, as I
shewed in §. 2. ¶. 2. of this Volumne.
I told you even now, that all the Punches for the same Body must not
have the same Heighth and Thickness: For some are Long; as, J j Q,
and several others; as you may see in the Drafts of Letters: and
these Long-Letters stand upon the whole Heighth of the Body.
The Ascending and Descending Letters reach from the Foot-Line, up
to the Top-Line; as all the Capital Letters are Ascending Letters, and
so are many of the Lower-Case Letters; as, b d f, and several others.
The Descending Letters are of the same Length with the Ascending
Letters; as, g p q and several others. These are contained between
the Head-Line and the Bottom-Line. The Short Letters are contained
between the Head-Line and the Bottom-line. These are three
different Sizes of Heighth the Punches are made to, for Letters of the
same Body. But in proper place I shall handle this Subject more
large and distinctly.
And as there is three Heighths or Sizes to be considered in Letters
Cut to the same Body, so is there three Sizes to be considered, with
respect to the Thicknesses of all these Letters, when the Punches
are to be Forged: For some are m thick; by m thick is meant m
Quadrat thick, which is just so thick as the Body is high: Some are n
thick; that is to say, n Quadrat thick, viz. half so thick as the Body is
high: And some are Space thick; that is, one quarter so thick as the
Body is high; though Spaces are seldom Cast so thick, as shall be
shewed when we come to Casting: and therefore, for distinction
sake, we shall call these Spaces, Thick Spaces.
The first three Sizes fit exactly in Heighth to all the Letters of the
same Body; but the last three Sizes fit not exactly in Thickness to the
Letters of the same Body; for that some few among the Capitals are
more than m thick, some less than m thick, and more than n thick;
and some less than n thick, and more than Space thick; yet for
Forging the Punches, these three Sizes are only in general
Considered, with Exception had to Æ Æ Q, and most of the Swash-
Letters; which being too thick to stand on an m, must be Forged
thicker, according to the Workman’s Reason.
After the Workman has accounted the exact number of Letters he is
to Cut for one Set, he considers what number he shall use of each of
these several Sizes in the Roman, and of each of these several
Sizes in the Italick; (for the Punches of Romans and Italicks, if the
Body is large, are not to be Forged to the same shape, as shall be
shewed by and by) and makes of a piece of Wood one Pattern of the
several Sizes that he must have each number Forged to. Upon every
one of these Wooden Patterns I use to write with a Pen and Ink the
number of Punches to be Forged of that Size, lest afterwards I might
be troubled with Recollections.
I say (for Example) He considers how many long Letters are m thick,
how many Long-Letters are n thick, and how many Long-Letters are
Space thick, in the Roman; and also considers which of these must
be Counter-punch’d, and which not: For (as was said before) those
Letters that are to be Counter-punch’d are to have about twice the
Heighth and twice the Thickness of the Face of the Counter-Punch,
for the Reason aforesaid. But the Letters not to be Counter-punch’d
need no more Substance but what will just contain the Face of the
Letter; and makes of these three Sizes three Wooden Patterns, of
the exact Length, Heighth and Thickness that the Steel Punches are
to be Forged to.
He also counts how many are Ascendents and Descendents, m
thick, n thick, and Space thick; still considering how many of them
are to be Counter-punch’d, and how many not; and makes Wooden
Patterns for them.
The like he does for short-letters; and makes Wooden Patterns for
them, for Steel Punches to be Forged by.
And as he has made his Patterns for the Roman, so he makes
Patterns for the Italick Letters also; for the same shap’d Punches will
not serve for Italick, unless he should create a great deal more Work
to himself than he need do: For Italick Punches are not all to be
Forged with their sides square to one another, as the Romans are;
but only the highest and lowest sides must stand in Line with the
highest and lowest sides of the Roman; but the Right and Left-Hand
sides stand not parallel to the Stems of the Roman, but must make
an Angle of 20 Degrees with the Roman Stems: so that the Figure of
the Face of the Punch will become a Rhomboides, as it is called by
Geometricians, and the Figure of this Face is the Slope that the
Italick Letters have from the Roman, as in proper place shall be
further shewed. Now, should the Punches for these Letters be
Forged with each side square to one another, the Letter-Cutter would
be forced to spend a great deal of Time, and take great pains to File
away the superfluous Steel about the Face of the Letter when he
comes to the Finishing of it, especially in great Bodied Letters. Yet
are not all the Italick Letters to be Forged on the Slope; for the
Punches of some of them, as the m n, and many others, may have
all, or, at least, three of their sides, square to one another, though
their Stems have the common Slope, because the ends of their
Beaks and Tails lie in the same, perpendicular with the Outer Points
of the Bottom and Top of their Stems, as is shewed in the Drafts of
Letters.
Though I have treated thus much on the Forging of Punches, yet
must all what I have said be understood only for great Bodied
Punches; viz. from the Great-Primer, and upwards. But for smaller
Bodies; as English, and downwards, the Letter-Cutter generally, both
for Romans and Italicks, gets so many square Rods of Steel, Forged
out of about two or three Foot in Length, as may serve his purpose;
which Rods he elects as near his Body and Sizes as his Judgment
will serve him to do; and with the edge of a Half-round File, or a
Cold-Chissel, cuts them into so many Lengths as he wants Punches.
Nay, many of these Rods may serve for some of the small Letters in
some of the greater Bodies; and also, for many of their Counter-
Punches.
Having thus prepared your Punches, you must Neal them, as I
shewed in Numb. 3. Vol. I.
¶. 2. Of Counter-Punches.
The Counter-Punches for great Letters are to be Forged as the

Letter-Punches; but for the smaller Letters, they may be cut out of
Rods of Steel, as aforesaid. They must also be well Neal’d, as the
Punches. Then must one of the ends be Filed away on the outside
the Shank, to the exact shape of the inside of the Letter you intend to
Cut. For Example, If it be A you would Cut; This Counter-Punch is
easie to make, because it is a Triangle; and by measuring the Inside
of the Angle of A in the Draft of Letters, as you were taught, §. 12. ¶.
6. you may make on your Standing Gage-Plate a Gage for that
Angle: So that, let the Letter to be Cut be of what Body you will, from
the least, to the biggest Body, you have a Standing Gage for this
Counter-Punch, so oft as you may have occasion to Cut A.
The Counter-Punch of A ought to be Forged Triangularly, especially
towards the Punching End, and Tryed by the A-Gage, as you were
taught to use the Square, Numb. 3. Vol. I. Yet, for this and other
Triangular Punches, I commonly reserve my worn- out three square
Files, and make my Counter-Punch of a piece of one of them that
best fits the Body I am to Cut.
Having by your A-Gage fitted the Top-Angle and the Sides of this
Counter-Punch, you must adjust its Heighth by one of the three
Face-Gages mentioned in §. 12. ¶. 5. viz. by the Ascending Face-
Gage; for A is an Ascending Letter. By Adjusting, I do not mean, you
must make the Counter-Punch so high, as the Depth of the
Ascending Face-Gage; because in this Letter here is to be
considered the Top and the Footing, which strictly, as by the large
Draft of A, make both together five sixth Parts of a thin Space:
Therefore five sixth Parts must be abated in the Heighth of your
Counter-Punch, and it must be but four thin Spaces, and one sixth
part of a thin Space high, because the Top above the Counter-
Punch, and the Footing below, makes five sixth Parts of a thin
Space, as aforesaid.
Therefore, to measure off the Width of four thin Spaces and one
sixth Part of a thin Space, lay three thin Spaces, or, which is better,
the Letter e, which is three thin Spaces, as aforesaid; and . which is
one thin Space and one sixth part of a thin Space, upon one another;
for they make together, four thin Spaces, and one sixth part of a thin
Space; and the thickness of these two Measures shall be the
Heighth of the Counter-Punch, between the Footing and the Inner
Angle of A. And thus, by this Example, you may couple with proper
Measures either the whole forty-two, which is the whole Body, or any
number of its Parts, as I told you before.
This Measure of four thin Spaces and one sixth part of a thin Space
is not a Measure, perhaps, used more in the whole Set of Letters to
be Cut to the present Body, therefore you need not make a Standing
Gage for it; yet a present Gage you must have: Therefore use the
Sliding-Gage (described in §. 12. ¶. 4. and Plate 10. at B.) and move
the Socket c c on the Beam a a, till the Edge of the Sholder of the
Square of the Socket at the under-side of the Beam stands just the
Width of four thin Spaces and one sixth part of a thin Space, from
the Point of the Tooth b; which you may do by applying the Measure
aforesaid just to the Square and Point of the Tooth; for then if you
Screw down the Screw in the upper-side of the Sliding Socket, it will
fasten the Square at that distance from the Point of the Tooth. And
by again applying the side of the Square to the Foot of the Face of
the Counter-Punch, you may with the Tooth describe a small race,
which will be the exact Heighth of the Counter-Punch for A. But A
hath a Fine stroak within it, reaching from Side to Side, which by the
large Draft of A, you may find that the middle of this cross stroak is
two Thin Spaces above the bottom of this Counter-Punch; and with
your common Sliding-Gage measure that distance as before, and set
off that distance also on the Face of your Counter-Punch. Then with
the edge of a Fine Knife-File, File straight down in that race, about
the depth of a Thin Space, or somewhat more; So shall the Counter-
Punch for A be finisht. But you may if you will, take off the Edges or
Sholder round about the Face of the Counter-Punch, almost so deep
as you intend to strike it into the Punch: for then the Face of the
Counter-Punch being Filed more to a Point, will easier enter the
Punch than the broad Flat-Face. But note, That if it be a very Small
Bodied A you would make, the Edge of a Thin Knife-File may make
too wide a Groove: In this case you must take a peece of a well-
Temper’d broken Knife, and strike its Edge into the Face of the
Counter-Punch, as aforesaid.
¶. 3. Of Sinking the Counter-Punches.
Having thus finisht his Counter-Punch, he Hardens and Tempers it,

as was taught Numb. 3. fol. 57, 58. Vol. I. And having also Filed the
Face of his Punch he intends to cut his A upon, pretty Flat by guess,
he Screws the Punch upright, and hard into the Vice: And setting the
Face of his Counter-Punch as exactly as he can, on the middle of
the Face of his Punch, he, with an Hammer suitable to the Size of
his Counter-Punch, strikes upon the end of the Counter-Punch till he
have driven the Face of it about two Thin Spaces deep into the Face
of the Punch. So shall the Counter-Punch have done its Office.
But if the Letter to be Counter-Puncht be large, as Great-Primmer, or
upwards, I take a good high Blood-red Heat of it, and Screw it
quickly into the Vice; And having my Counter-Punch Hard, not
Temper’d, because the Heat of the Punch softens it too fast: And
also having before-hand the Counter-Punch Screwed into the Hand-
Vice with its Shank along the Chaps, I place the Face of the
Counter-Punch as before, on the middle of the Face of the Punch,
and with an Hammer drive it in, as before.
Taking the Punch out of the Vice, he goes about to Flat and
Smoothen the Face in earnest; for it had been to no purpose to Flat
and Smoothen it exactly before, because the Sinking of the Counter-
Punch into it, would have put it out of Flat again.
But before he Flats and Smoothens the Face of the Punch, He Files
by guess the superfluous Steel away about the Face of the Letter,
viz. so much, or near so much, as is not to be used when he comes
to finish up the Letter, as in this present Letter A, which standing
upon a Square Face on the Punch, meets in an Angle at the Top of
the Letter. Therefore the Sides of that Square must be Filed away to
an Angle at the Top of the Face of the Punch. But great care must be
taken, that he Files not more away than he should: For he considers
that the left-hand Stroak of A is a Fat Stroak, and that both the left-
hand and the right-hand Stroak too, have Footings, which he is
careful to leave Steel enough in their proper places for.
The reason why these are now Fil’d thus away, and not after the
Letter is finisht, is, Because in the Flatting the Face there is now a
less Body of Steel to File away, than if the whole Face of the Punch
had remain’d intire: For though the following ways are quick ways to
Flatten the Face, yet considering how tenderly you go to Work, and
with what Smooth Files this Work must be done, the riddance made
will be far less when a broad Face of Steel is to be Flatned, than
when only so much, or very little more than the Face of the Letter
only is to be Flatned.
To Flat and Smoothen the Face of the Punch, he uses the Flat-
Gage, (described §. 12. ¶. 3. and Plate 10. at A.) thus, He fits one
convex corner of the Shank of the Punch, into the Concave corner of
the Flat-Gage, and so applies his Flat-Gage-Punch and all to the
Face of the Using-File, and lets the Counter-Puncht end, viz. the
Face of the Punch Sink down to the Face of the Using-File: And then
keeping the convex Corner of the Shank of the Punch close and
steddy against the Concave corner of the Flat-Gage, and pressing
with one of his Fingers upon the then upper end of the Punch, viz.
the Hammer-end, he also at the same time, presses the lower end of
the Punch, viz. The Face against the Using-File, and thrusts the Flat-
Gage and Punch in it so oft forwards, till the extuberant Steel on the

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The Socialist Market Economy in Asia:

Development in China, Vietnam and

The Socialist Market

ISBN 978-981-15-6247-1 ISBN 978-981-15-6248-8 (eBook)

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2020

Oslo Arve Hansen

Part I The Socialist Market Economy: Ideology and

1 Introducing the Socialist Market Economy 3

2 The International Politics of Economic Reforms

3 China and Vietnam as Instances of Consolidated

Part II State, Market and the Environment

4 Governance, the Socialist Market Economy,

5 Reforming State-Owned Enterprises in a Global

6 Rural Revolutions: Socialist, Market and Sustainable

7 Evolving Environmental Governance Structures

Part III State and Society: Inequality, Class and Conflict

8 Consumer Socialism: Consumption, Development

9 Labour Conflicts in the Socialist Market Economy:

10 Welfare and Social Policy in China: Building a New

11 Capitalist Transformation and Habitus in Laos 291

Part IV Concluding Observations

12 Making Sense of the Socialist Market Economy 315

Jo Inge Bekkevold is Senior Adviser at the Norwegian Institute for

Arve Hansen is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Centre for Development and

Fig. 1.1 Annual GDP per capita growth: China 1978–2017,

Table 1.1 Measuring development in the socialist market economy 8

The Socialist Market Economy: Ideology

Introducing the Socialist Market Economy

Jo Inge Bekkevold, Arve Hansen, and Kristen Nordhaug

© The Author(s) 2020 3

This introductory chapter briefly presents the main developments in

The Socialist Market Economies

1 Calculated based on data.worldbank.org.

Table 1.1 Measuring development in the socialist market economy

China China Vietnam Vietnam Laos Laos

GDP/capita/PPP 987 16,807 939 6775 1103 7023

Source World Development Indicators and Human Development Index

What Is a Socialist Market Economy?

Congress in 2017, incorporated into the Constitution of the Communist

The socialist-oriented market economy in Vietnam is a type of organization

an economy operating fully and synchronously according to the rule of a

What Kind of Development Model?

control of ‘the commanding heights of the economy’. In all three coun-

3 Alternative explanations have been presented, that the ‘weighted combination’ of

entrepreneurial spirit in rural China in the 1980s were reversed and

Varieties of Socialist Market Economies

normally dated to 1986. When China launched the reform process, it

Making Sense of the Socialist Market

middle classes through the particular political-economic contexts that

The Flat-Gage is described in Plate 10. at A. It is made of a flat piece

The Sliding-Gage is described in Plate 10. at Fig. B. It is a Tool

¶. 5. Of the Face-Gages, marked C in Plate 10.

¶. 6. Of Italick, and other Standing Gages.

The Liner is marked E in Plate 10. It is a thin Plate of Iron or Brass,

¶. 10. Of Furnishing the Work-Bench.

The Counter-Punches for great Letters are to be Forged as the

¶. 3. Of Sinking the Counter-Punches.

Having thus finisht his Counter-Punch, he Hardens and Tempers it,

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